A Goodbye Present
by dreamshell
Summary: Chasing Amy. 3 months later, Banky gets a call from Holden. How the last issue of their comic came to be.


A Goodbye Present

Banky wakes up to the phone ringing. He raises a hand up lazily through the Superman sheets he's wound up in and picks up the receiver.

"Hello?" he yawns.

"Banky."

Banky is up with a start. He feels his heartbeat quicken and suddenly, he's dying for a cigarette. He can't believe it. That voice...it's Holden's. He tries to say something, but nothing comes out.

On the other end of the phone, Holden sighs. "Look, I know I flaked out on you...and I'm sure that you probably don't want to hear from me--and I know I probably woke you up," he adds with a small chuckle, "but...just, go downstairs and check your mail."

Without thinking, Banky gets out of bed. He stumbles through the mess of unwashed clothes that cover his bedroom floor ("What're you, fuckin' fourteen?" Holden had commented on numerous occasions upon stepping into his room) and sets the phone down on his nightstand, managing to mumble a timid "Uh, hang on, okay?".

He sticks his feet into a pair of shorts that look passably clean and pulls them up around his Scooby-Doo boxers. Forgetting socks, he puts on a pair of old Chucks before opening the nightstand drawer clumsily and taking out a key. Closing the drawer, he picks the phone back up.

"Okay," he says and leaves his room. As he passes through the apartment to get downstairs, he takes in the living room and recalls the familiar unfamiliarity of not seeing Holden sitting on his couch playing a game of hockey on the Sega.

"God, it's been three months, man..." Banky whispers to himself, then realizes Holden must have heard him.

"I know," is all Holden says before he returns to silent waiting.

Banky trods noisily down the flight of stairs that lead to the bottom floor of the apartment building. He passes a dainty-looking woman on his way down, one of the handful of single mothers in the joint, who gives him a wide-eyed look of surprise as he tramples downstairs.

At the row of mail slots, Banky searches for his own and, in his hurry, puts his key in the wrong one. Looking to the one on his left, he sees his apartment number and replaces the key, opening the slot. Inside there's a few bills, a notice from his new agent, a letter from Publisher's Clearing House, and a manila envelope. He pulls out the envelope and, lifting the pins in the back, looks inside and sees a collection of drawings. He takes them out of the envelope and realizes that the papers make up the rough version of a comic. And not just any comic, but his and Holden's very own "Bluntman & Chronic". On the front page he sees the stenciled picture of the Blunt Knight holding his skinny, potty-mouthed sidekick in his arms. A title card below them reads: "The INEVITABLE DEATH of CHRONIC!".

"What is this?" Banky asks.

"A goodbye present."

Banky leafs through the pages. "I don't get it..."

"Well, I figure it's pretty obvious this isn't going to be a long-running series," Holden says. "So, I drew that up and problem solved." He pauses. "Well, one of them, anyway."

"What about--"

"I'm sorry if it's not what you wanted--" Holden starts.

"No, no," Banky stops him, starting to read the comic. "It's...this is...this is _good_..."

"Do whatever you like with it. Ink it, color it, get it published," Holden tells him. "Fuck, say you did all yourself, I don't care. It's yours."

Banky frowns. "I don't need you to try and make me feel good about being a _tracer_, McNeil."

"Sorry," Holden says, a little more diffident than he's been so far.

Banky looks down at the comic again. A part of him hates admitting it, but this is a damn good issue Holden's written, maybe his best. Or, at least, the best that can be written for a comic book about two superhero stoners.

"You know, I started my own comic."

"Yeah, I know," Holden says. "I've read every one of 'em so far. I'm really impressed."

Banky can't help but smile. In all the years they'd known each other, the opinions he always really worried over were Holden's.

"Thanks."

"So...how's things with you and Hooper?" Holden asks. Banky can hear the grin in his voice.

"How'd you find out about that?"

"Oh, just something I read in the tabloids."

"You shouldn't believe everything you read," Banky chuckles.

There's a moment's pause. "I'm happy for you," Holden says.

"I'm happy for me, too." Banky puts the pages back into the envelope and puts it and the rest of his mail under his arm. "So, how'd you know you woke me up?"

"I know you."

This hits Banky harder than it probably should. He stands in the lobby of the building, staring ahead at nothing. There's a million things he'd like to say to Holden, but he can't put any of it into words. When it came to expressing himself, Banky never was very gifted.

Banky gathers himself together. "Hey, listen, man...where are you?" he asks.

Holden doesn't say anything for a long time and Banky wonders if maybe his cordless phone has died. He takes a quick look, but no, it's still on.

"Holden?"

"I...I gotta go, Bank."

"Hey, wait a second, I--"

Banky hears the phone on the other end click and die. The moan of the dial tone whines in his ear and he turns the phone off. He gets a quick idea and pulls the envelope back out, checks for a return address. Oddly, there is none. Sighing deeply, Banky closes his mail slot and heads back upstairs to start inking--fine, he thinks, _tracing_--the last issue ever of Bluntman & Chronic.


End file.
